Delay Costing Lives

His comments follow the stabbing death of a 23-year-old Aboriginal man on Eveleigh Street last month.

Mr Mundine, also the CEO of the Aboriginal Housing Company, said the company would fight the NSW Planning Department in the Land and Environment Court unless it waives a $60,00 fee to assess its Pemulwuy development for Redfern.

The DA for Pemulwuy is for 62 new houses for Aboriginal families living on Eveleigh Street and will include social initiatives to prevent crime and drugs from returning to the area once the homes are built.

A cultural centre and other community spaces are also included in the plan.

Mr Mundine said the fee was unreasonable and the organisation would have no hesitation taking the matter to the LEC. The impasse, reported in

Central in early March, has halted progress of the Pemulway project, which Mr Mundine said was essential to saving lives in impoverished parts of suburb, including the Block. Mr Mundine said the Planning Department should waive any assessment fees because the AHC was a non profit community organisation.

"We can't afford to give them anything - we have no money," Mr Mundine said. "There has never been any funding to put this together, the $250,000 for the plan was donated by the architect.

"We are a non-profit organisation, we are not going to make any money out of this project, and everything will be going back into the community."

A Department of Planning spokesman said a final figure had not yet been determined as it was still waiting on information from the AHC.

Mr Mundine said the Pemulway project had been "held back" for a number of years, and the Government had to accept some responsibility for crime and drug-related problems at the Block.

"If it was not because of this Government the development would have happened by now," he said. "It's costing lives, someone died in the Block the other week. That murder would not have happened if this project had been completed."

Photo: Phil Rogers - Mick Mundine wants the Pemulway project fast tracked for the good of Redfern.